WATCH THEIR MAIL
One morning I received the following order:
"Investigate Sokol, Monroe Street, No. ——. Night visit preferable."
When I asked the Manager what he meant by night visit he told me between ten and eleven o'clock. Accordingly, at ten P. M. I knocked at the door of the above named family. In the few minutes that elapsed between the knocking and the opening of the door I heard a man groaning—as men groan under excruciating pain.
The woman, Mrs. Sokol, opened the door for me, and inquired who I was. I was instructed by the office not to tell them my identity under any circumstances. So I said I was from the Board of Health—that neighbours had claimed that they could not sleep on account of the man's groans, and I told Mrs. Sokol that we would have to see him and send him to a hospital. I entered the apartment. There were two rooms. In one room was the bed with the sick man in it. The other room was the kitchen, dining and reception room. A cold stove, a table, four chairs, and on one side two more folding beds. This was the furniture.
The man kept groaning. His wife whispered to him to keep still, but his pains were probably so great that he could not understand what she said. I lit the gas and approached the bed. A strong odour of putrefaction compelled me to withdraw, and the next moment the wife told me that he had a cancer, that he had been operated upon several times without success and that he now suffered the most excruciating pains; that the doctor came only once in two days, only to have a look—"to see if he is already dead," as she put it.
"Why don't you send him to the Skin and Cancer Hospital?" I asked.
"We are only two years in this country," was the woman's reply, "and they will send us back to Russia."